Antoninus Pius

It was in natural harmony with the temper of a quiet people amid the spectacle of rural life, like that simpler faith between man and man which Tibullus expressly connects with the period when, with an inexpensive worship, the old wooden gods had been still pressed for room in their homely little shrines.

And about the time when the dying Antoninus Pius ordered his golden image of fortune to be carried into the chamber of his successor, now about to test the truth of the old Platonic contention that the world would at last find itself happy could it detach some reluctant philosophic student from the more desirable life of celestial contemplation and compel him to rule it.

There was a boy living in an old country house, half farm, half villa, who, for himself, recruited that body of antique traditions by a spontaneous force of religious veneration such as had originally called them into being.

More than a century and a half had passed since Tibullus had written, but the restoration of religious usages and their retention where they still survived was meantime come to be the fashion through the influence of imperial example, and what had been in the main a matter of family pride with his father was sustained by a native instinct of devotion in the young Marius.

Vulgarity seemed impossible.

The place, though impoverished, was still deservedly dear, full of venerable memories and with a living sweetness of its own for today.

To hold by such ceremonial traditions had been a part of the struggling family pride of the lad's father, to which the example of the head of the state, old Antoninus Pius, an example to be still further enforced by his successor, had given a fresh, though perhaps somewhat artificial, popularity.

It had been consistent with many another homely and old-fashioned trait in him not to undervalue the charm of exclusiveness and immemorial authority, which membership in a local priestly college, hereditary in his house, conferred upon him.

So sad.

The r- the Gemara says in Masechet Sanhedrin, in source number two, very interesting Gemara, when does the neshamah enter the body? When does the neshamah enter the body? This is a debate between Rebbe, Rebbe Yehuda HaNasi, who put together the Mishnah, and a Roman intellectual called Antoninus.

And these two, uh, individuals, they spoke a lot about Jewish philosophy and the differences between Jewish thought and Greek wisdom, et cetera.

He had the following, one of the questions that they discussed, was, "Neshamah me'eitay nitna beadam?" When does the neshamah go into the, the person? When does a person get their neshamah?

So that's a machloket.

Amar lo mishat yetzirah.

Uh, so Rebbe, Rebbe answered Antoninus that the neshamah goes in from the time of formation of the embryo, okay? Which is a later stage.

So comes, uh, Antoninus' response to him.

So the mausoleum was initially constructed between 125 and 139 CE.

Now, Hadrian actually dies in 138, so the construction is completed by his successor, Antoninus Pius.

And Hadrian is buried there, as is his wife Sabina, his adopted son Lucius Aelius, who was supposed to be his heir but dies before Hadrian.

And then all of the emperors who succeed Hadrian are buried there up through Caracalla, who dies in 217.

Hadrian visited many of the cities of the Greek East, and he completed the Temple of Olympian Zeus in Athens, which had been worked on intermittently for almost seven hundred years and now became the largest temple in the Greek world.

Hadrian was followed in one thirty-eight by Antoninus Pius, who left a surplus in the state treasury despite the fact that he paid for material improvements like aqueducts and roads across the empire and gave tax exemptions to cities that had suffered natural disasters like fires or earthquakes.

He also shared Hadrian's admiration for Greek culture.

He built temples in Greek cities and exempted philosophers and orators from the duty to share their wealth with the cities where they lived.

The mentor shares their wisdom and experience while the mentee offers fresh perspectives and challenges the mentor to continue evolving.

As Marcus Aurelius wrote in his Meditations, "From my brother Severus, I learned to love my kin and to love truth and to love justice." Marcus Aurelius, the Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher, was deeply influenced by his own mentors, including his adoptive father, Antoninus Pius, and the philosopher Junius Rusticus.

Their guidance and example shaped his character and helped him become one of the most respected leaders in history.

The modern-day mentor.